Antisocial policy

There has been a lot of talk recently about changes to the welfare state by the UK Government that will see 100,000 Scots in social housing lose up to a quarter of the money they need to pay their rent.

This will take £500 million out of the pockets of some of our country’s poorest and most vulnerable citizens just when they need it the most.

Many people have rightly ­remarked upon the callous, unjust nature of this policy and the adverse impact it will have upon families struggling to make ends meet in the face of Westminster’s unrelenting ­austerity and triple-dip recession. One in five Scottish children already lives in poverty and this is set to get worse.

But we can choose a different path. An independent Scotland could stop the destruction of our welfare state. A Yes vote in 2014 will empower the Scottish Parliament to build a welfare system that is just, democratic and sustainable.

Leading businessmen such as Jim McColl, Sir George Mathewson and Sir Brian Souter, and Nobel Prize-winning economist Joesph Stiglitz support independence because they believe it is the only way we can build a socially just and economically prosperous Scotland. Independence isn’t an end in itself – it is the means to realising all our dreams of what Scotland can and should be.

We shouldn’t be afraid to seize the endless opportunities that self-government brings. Our poor cannot afford to pay the price of a No vote. The human cost of continued Westminster rule will be too great.